Your Home Away From Home

From all-inclusive luxury resorts to backpacker hostels, Costa Rica has accommodations to suit every taste and budget. Travelers will find friendly staff and modern amenities such as Wi-Fi internet in many hotels throughout the country. Towns such as La Fortuna (near Arenal Volcano) and Jaco have experienced a recent boom in development and are brimming with a variety of new hostels and hotels.

Other popular destinations like Monteverde, Puerto Viejo, San José, Quepos and Manuel Antonio offer visitors everything from simple cabinas to posh resorts. Travelers can enjoy the cozy charm of a bed and breakfast or family-run hotel in the smaller towns of Samara, Cahuita and Drake Bay.

Reservations are a must, especially in the high season (December through April). If booking a trip during Christmas or Easter week, travelers should reserve rooms at least one to two months in advance. Many hotel websites have online reservation forms and provide fast (if not instant) booking confirmation. Visitors who prefer spontaneous travel should plan their trips during the low season (late May through November) when walk-in accommodations are easier to come by.

Travelers are advised to re-confirm hotel reservations prior to arrival to avoid any unnecessary confusion.

 Hotels by Destination:

• Arenal Hotels

• Drake Bay Hotels

• Manuel Antonio Hotels

• Quepos Hotels

• San Jose Hotels

Insider's Tip:

The international airport is actually located in Alajuela, not San José. Just five minutes from the aiport, Alajuela has an array of hotels and tourist amenities and is a great travel base for many Central Valley destinations. Read more about Alajuela.

Another convenient assortment of hotels is located on the San Jose side of the airport in Cuidad Cariari (just 5 miles from the airport), where several four and five star hotel resorts may be found. Here guests are close enough to San Jose to enjoy all of its amenities, while far enough away to avoid most of the inner city traffic and crowds.

A Word of Advice: Many of the smaller hotels do not have central water heaters, but offer hot water showers via electric shower heads. Temperature is controlled by adjusting the volume of water. Read More about the Showers...